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Paramount Pictures believes that the smart way to go with The Core -- a special FX-laden disaster movie about a journey to the center of the earth - is to cast actors not commonly associated with big SF titles. Eckart, still relatively unknown despite a co-starring role in Erin Brockovich, leads the cast as Dr. Josh Keyes, a geophysicist who discovers that an unknown force has caused Earth's inner core to stop rotating. He joins a team of the world's top scientists on a trip to the center of the planet -- in a subterranean craft called The Virgil - in the hopes of detonating a device that will reactivate the core. Lindo plays Ed Brazzelton, the vessel's designer and engineer, Swank (who won an Oscar for Boys Don't Cry) stars as Rebecca Childs, the Virgil's pilot. The rest of the cast includes Bruce (Nowhere Man) Greenwood, Alfre (Star Trek) Woodard, Stanley Tucci, DJ Quails and Tcheky Karyo.
Earth's magnetic field is deteriorating, and microwave radiation is starting to destroy the planet," Ariel explains. "That's our fundamental scenario. With three months left, these engineers, scietists and pilots set out aboard an untested craft for an extraordinary journey. Their initial plan is to detonate five 200-megaton nuclear bombs in a single burst at the Earth's core, which will create a wave pattern that will restart it.
"We're making a character-driven visual effects movie, and I don't think those two things together are an oxymoron," Amiel adds. "I believe they're completely compatible."
Casting, therefore, was critical. Of his group of unlikely action heroes. Amiel says: "I went out to get the most interesting actors I could find. They're wildly disparate in character, and that was part of the attraction. This movie may be about the end of the world, but there are a lot of laughs along the way. It has an upbeat, warm and irreverent nature.
As the crew prepares for another sequence inside the Virgil cockpit, Greenwood settles in at the helm. He plays Colonel Robert Iverson, the mission commander. The shot starts with a close-up of Greenwood's hand as he summons Eckhart (as Dr. Keyes) and Tucci (as Dr. Zimsky) to his side. At Amiel's call of "Action," Greenwood's hand points to the view screen and he calls for them. But the two actors behind him don't come forward fast enough, and they start over. This time, Greenwood's hand drifts too low in the frame. The third time, Tucci and Eckhart arrive too quickly. Between each take, Greenwood hams it up with silly hand gestures, and soon the whole crew is laughing. Eventually, they move on to another scene. Greenwood is supposed to call out to "Doctors Zimsky and Keyes," but what comes out is "Doctors Zimsky and peas." He nails it on the next take, and finds himself with a few minutes to discuss the project.
"This movie has every chance of being quite watchable," he offers. "One of the reasons I was excited about being a part of this is that the cast is really good. They make something more out of something that, on its face, is pretty stock. And the dialogue is clever and the characters are polar enough, so there's plenty of tensions between them. It's fun, interesting and quite human. Hopefully, within the big spectacle that this movie undoubtedly will be, at the heart of it there are characters you find fun to watch."
According to Greenwood, Colonel Iverson is "one of those tremendously capable guys who was an astronaut in his early 30s. He is tapped to be a part of this mission because of some exquisite flying under pressure that he does at the outset [of the film]. As the commander, he's the guy who the others look to when things get sticky. He serves the purpose of setting the bar at a certain height for Beck Childs to jump over. And when he's not able to be there, Beck has to step up to the plate. That's really my character's function."
Early in the picture, geomagnetic disturbances cause the Space Shuttle to crash. Real-life NASA astronaut Tom Jones was a consultant on the production, and Greenwood particularly enjoyed spending time with him. "It was fascinating talking with him and seeing his home movie footage of re-entry, which we had to re-create in this movie. That was fun."
Pretending to be weightless was "tricky," Greenwood adds. "When Iverson makes his entrance, he floats in. I was on the end of a teeter-totter kind of thing for the Space Shuttle staff. It felt oafish and goofy, and when I watched the playback on the monitor, I would say, "OK, I've got to remember to let my hands stretch out." Just little things like that . Working within a confined space and making it physically interesting was tricky, too."
Eckhart at last becomes available....."I think we have some good stuff in here," he continues. "We have many highs and lows. When the scenes need levity, I've tried to get there -- you're not going to see a stony-faced actor trying to be cool. That will be novel in itself. Josh is a guy who feels pain, feels joy, is self-effacing, and falls in love despite himself. This is Starship Troopers, we all looked at each other in rehearsals and said, 'What are you doing here?' I remember Bruce Greenwood and I had a conversation where we said, 'Let's try to make this good.' The material is real. I just wanted to do a movie that kids could see."
